Parental role in children's sport participation: A grounded theory interpretation of social support theory from an alternative perspective

While parental social support is recognized as crucial for children's sport participation, its reciprocal nature and the meaning-making experience for parents themselves remain underexplored. This study moves beyond a unidirectional view by employing an integrated theoretical framework to examine parental support as a bidirectional process through which parents derive fulfillment and construct their identities. Utilizing a Constructivist Grounded Theory approach, the study draws on focused, in-situ interviews with 14 active parents to capture the specific nuances of their involvement. Data were analyzed through iterative coding, analyst triangulation, and peer debriefing. Findings reveal that parental practices—articulated through emotional, informational, and instrumental support—are not merely acts of provision but are deeply motivated by reciprocal emotional rewards, autonomy-supportive intentions, and strategic goals aligned with ideologies of “good parenting.” This research reconceptualizes parental involvement by offering an enriched model where Social Support Theory provides the structural basis, enacted through the strategic intent of Concerted Cultivation, regulated by Self-Determination Theory, and sustained by vicarious reinforcement mechanisms of Social Learning Theory. The result is a novel, relational framework that shifts the analytical lens from what support is provided to the more complex questions of why it is offered and how it is co-constructed in the parent–child dyad. © The Author(s) 2026. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access page (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).